All the Reefs in the Mall

 

I've given the shadows fins and filled the tiles with a hose

I found curled behind that door. I stole the moss from an oak

in the parking lot. I tripped over the asphalt;

there could have been a mini-sward, a puddle lawn of grass

back in the day, before the stores closed and the cars left.

There's just a dark dip and furrow and a thick trunk;

shadows crumble, here, too. 

I heard the cars swishing by, beyond the remains of the theater.

I watched movies in that theater. I stood in the lobby with friends.

I remember the yellow carpet. I remember the rectangle cut doorways,

the posters, the bathrooms, the impatience, the darkness.

This place shouldn't have carpet. 

I pulled it up. I scraped it off with a shovel--who left

a shovel leaning against an inner wall? 

Kids played here. They could have been hurt--

maybe the carpet helped. 

We didn't need carpet, though. 

We needed tiles, like a path through the lights.

I don't know where the fish came from.

I think...there used to be a pet store.

And an import store. Someone must have

poured them from a ceramic stool, from a woven basket,

from a broken wish, from a kiss that never happened.

I hung the moss while I waited for the dragonflies

among the canlights, spots dropped brilliant

across the backs of fish, like silver someone dropped,

like the polish and tin and sugar glaze

not ever dimming under the glass banks

like fish in a reef, all the trinkets in a mall.

I'm waiting for the dragonflies.

I'll hear the tink of their nails against the edges

of the tiles as yet undrowned.

I should have pulled up more carpet.